NTU Pushes Retrans Reform

The 362,000-member National Taxpayers Union (www.ntu.org) urged Senate Commerce Committee Members to spend their Wednesday hearing exploring how to untangle the âcomplicated web of preferences and regulations that have made a mess of TV retransmission consent ne...

Nov 16th, 2010

The 362,000-member National Taxpayers Union (www.ntu.org) urged Senate Commerce Committee Members to spend their Wednesday hearing exploring how to untangle the “complicated web of preferences and regulations that have made a mess of TV retransmission consent negotiations, rather than resorting to greater government intervention in the marketplace.”

"The problem is not that the FCC lacks authority to intervene, but that a slew of poorly-designed rules nearly two decades old prevent geographic competition and encourage episodes of brinksmanship like the Fox-Cablevision fight," NTU Director of Government Affairs Andrew Moylan said. "The rules governing retransmission consent were designed to shield content providers from a cable monopoly that no longer exists, and now those providers are exploiting that protection to the fullest."